Anglers –
April 8, 2017

With the spring season now officially arriving, belated daylight savings time also now adjusted, we continue to see increasing numbers of tourists, most schools have now taken off, or are in the process of their spring vacation break. Local schools will be out this coming week and this is also traditionally the period when families take extended time off from daily routines, majority of them going on beach camping excursions, hard to find locals that will be available to work this coming weekend, this is time to spend with family and friends.

Weather patterns have been very pleasant, still dropping down into the upper 50 early in the mornings, days have been mostly clear, plenty of warm sunshine, highs near 90 degrees and winds were moderate, southern swells are becoming more predominate in recent weeks. Businesses have been busy providing services for vacationers, a good percentage deciding to their luck at sportfishing.

With higher surf conditions, the bait netters were not able to reach the schools of sardinas, warmer currents, now up to 73/74 degrees, have brought in more caballito in the marina area, anglers are also using some ballyhoo and squid. Some bottom action is being found with yo-yo jigs and the open water trolling is starting to finally produce some action. The warmer current is now closer to shore, off of San Del Cabo and towards Los Frailes, offshore the water is cooler, down to 70 degrees.

The striped marlin action improved overall this past week, on and off action trolling with lures and dropping back baits, near the 1150 spot, also shifting north off of San Luis, encouraging sign to see some billfish activity, it had been very limited throughout winter, now every day you are hearing about people having opportunities at marlin. Also a few reports of dorado offshore. Yellowfin tuna are striking on hoochie type lures closer to shore near Iman Bank, smaller tuna to 15 lb. Some yellowfin to over 30 lb. were landed from the charters that tried drift fishing over the same grounds, strips of squid is what enticed these larger tuna, though this bite was sporadic, one day s few fish, the next day none.

This week the action improved as the water temperatures warmed, cleaner currents shifted closer to shore north of Punta Gorda and winds laid down. The grounds from Cardon, La Fortuna, Iman and San Luis all showed better signs of surface action, wahoo even became more active later in the week, striking on trolled skirted lures and Rapalas, weighing to over 40 lb., also striped marlin were hooked into and smaller grade of yellowfin tuna striking on lures. These same grounds produced a mix of bottom species, a few more amberjack showing up, striking on yo-yo jigs, one amber weighed in at 90 lb. Heard of one nice yellowtail and a handful of leopard grouper. The big red snapper bite on the Outer Gordo Banks faded out, as the unusual run of larger crabs diminished, commercial fleet has been imported the smaller pelagic red crabs for use as bait for the snapper, though when the bigger crabs were drifting to the surface, those are what really produced the larger grade of red snapper, locally referred to as huachinango.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 78 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 14 striped marlin, 15 wahoo, 2 dorado, 36 yellowfin tuna, 1 yellowtail, 17 amberjack, 24 yellow snapper, , 15 leopard grouper, 380 huachinango, 12 sierra, 10 mojarra, 30 black skipjack and 80 triggerfish.

Good fishing, Eric

Anglers –
March 25, 2017

For some reason this week was not so busy with tourists, in between waves of spring breakers perhaps. The annual San Jose del Cabo traditional Fiestas have come and gone now without any major incidents, though they are still in the cleanup process on the grounds adjacent to the baseball park. Ideal weather patterns continue, still a bit cool early in the morning, but daytime temperatures have been reaching into the mid-80s, clear warm sunny skies. Still good numbers of whales being seen, this now being their late season, getting ready to migrate back to the northern feeding grounds.

Ocean swells increased this week, making it very difficult for the bait netters to reach inshore rocky areas where the sardinas were schooling. Other bait sources included limited caballito, ballyhoo, squid and red crabs. Larger crabs were once again found drifting to the surface on the Outer Gordo Banks and were being gathered for use for bottom fish action. Currents have varied, not being quite as strong as they had been, winds were a factor later in the week, then settling down for the weekend. Ocean temperature ranged from 68 to 74 degrees through most of the region, with the warmest areas being offshore of San Jose del Cabo some 6 to 8 miles. Blue water has been found within several miles of shore.

Last week the big news was a great bite for wahoo during a time frame that is not typical for this elusive gamefish, as they were found in schools close to shore off of Punta Gorda. The combination of heavy pressure for multiple days and ocean conditions that cooled off and became a bit greenish contributed to that action fading out. This week the most productive bite was for red snapper, or locally called huachinango, these are the true Pacific red snapper, found over offshore structure, striking readily on various crabs baits, a few on yo-yo jigs as well, these extremely prized eating fish average in the 5 to 12 lb. range, very scrappy fighters on lighter tackle. The largest sized snapper were recently coming from the Outer Gordo Banks, while other areas closer to shore were producing a smaller grade or snapper.

Not much going on for any surface action now, anglers at times were seeing the yellowfin tuna showing on the surface, but they proved very finicky and with the lack of sardinas due to higher surf conditions, this made it difficult to entice any tuna strikes, very few were landed this past week. Dorado were even scarcer and the billfish bite has been late to get going. We did hear of reports of striped marlin near the 1150 high spot and even a couple of dorado, this area had warmer water temperatures, so maybe something will finally start to happen offshore.

Inshore there has not been much besides some sierra and triggerfish, as water starts to warm back up, we should see the juvenile roosterfish move in. Then later in the spring as the mullet show up, that will attract the larger roosters and other jacks.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 60 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 9 yellowfin tuna, 6 amberjack, 14 yellow snapper, 11 flag cabrilla, 13 leopard grouper, 420 huachinango, 21 sierra, 105 black skipjack and 95 triggerfish.

Good fishing, Eric

Anglers –
March 18, 2017

A steady flow of spring break vacationers continue to arrive in Los Cabos, also this is the big week for the annual San Jose del Cabo traditional as well, so the town is very busy. The weather is progressively warming up, already feeling like late spring, winds were light in recent days, skies were clear and high temperatures were in the mid-80s, ideal climate now. Still lots of whales being sighted, we expect with this warming trend, that these mammals will start heading north soon.

Schools of sardinas are being found near Palmilla, on most days sufficient supplies were being netted, other bait options included ballyhoo and strips of squid. Most of the local action has now been found from off of Palmilla, to Punta Gorda, La Fortuna and to the Iman Bank. Not much at all being found further offshore for the charters that did scout that out, lack of billfish action at this time, most charters are fishing closer to shore and over the normal rocky structure areas until reports offshore improve

Yellowfin tuna action was very spotty, the tuna were seen at times on the surface, but were very finicky in striking baits, not hitting on lures either. Best chances were found while drift fishing or slow trolling with live sardinas over the grounds of La Fortuna and the Iman Bank, we were only seeing a handful of yellowfin landed each day, anglers were fortunate to land one of them, of the fish we saw, they averaged 20 to 30 lb, though we did see one 60 lb. fish brought in mid-week. There were more black skipjack than anything else.

Off the bottom, on these same grounds, we saw a mix of species such as yellow snapper, island jack, amherjack, cabrilla, red snapper, pargo and triggerfish. Not a lot of larger fish, mostly in the 4 to 10 lb. range, no big quantities either, but all very good eating. Strong currents have been running, this never helps anything, especially when fishing the bottom. Inshore the main action was for sierra while using sardinas, we saw a few nicer sized fish up to eight pounds accounted for.

We have not seen any dorado recently, though we did have big surprise with a wahoo bite developing off of Punta Gorda, this is something we normally would see in December. Even though the water temperature is in the lower 70s, there were sizable schools of wahoo holding in this area, which is less than a mile from shore. Sizes ranging from 15 lb. to 60 lb. Fish were a bit finicky, coming up on baits, most often not striking, other times they would hit sardinas or rigged ballyhoo and many also hit on yo-yo jigs. A few of the local skippers tried other techniques normally used only while trying to snag baitfish such as mullet, not an approved method, but wahoo are very elusive and open game. Of course the word got out of this action by later in the week and then we saw free divers with spears working the same spot, this is always a quick way to spook the fish out of the area. With the ongoing warming trend anything can happen and this wahoo action in recent days has been a prime example of this, as March is not the normal season when we find these prized sought after gamefish.

The combined panga fleets launching out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina sent out approximately 72 charters for the week, with anglers reporting a fish count of: 24 yellowfin tuna, 7 amberjack, 2 island jacks, 1 sheepshead, 33 wahoo, 25 yellow snapper, 14 flag cabrilla, 19 leopard grouper, 62 huachinango, 75 sierra, 60 black skipjack and 110 triggerfish.

Good fishing, Eric